■ IBM, Bowa join forces
IBM Taiwan said yesterday that it had joined forces with Bowa Bank (寶華銀行), formerly known as Pan Asia Bank (泛亞銀行), to transform the lender's information technology infrastructure. Under the seven-year agreement, IBM will work with Bowa to upgrade its small and medium business financing and personal finance operations, they said in a joint statement, as the financial sector is facing more competition and domestic lenders are focusing on deepening relationships with key clients."Since [Taiwan's] WTO entry, foreign banks have entered the domestic financial services market and brought new financial products and new sales models to the Taiwan market, raising the competitive pressure for local banks," Bowa president Victor Liu (劉維琪) said.
■ Cross-strait trade growing
Taiwan's growing trade reliance on China may create greater risks amid the political tensions between the two sides, according to a report made public by the Bureau of Foreign Trade under the Ministry of Economic Affairs. With exports to and imports from China increasing during the past 10 years, Taiwan's foreign trade reliance on China has surged, the bureau report on 1994-2003 structural changes on Taiwan's outbound and inbound shipments said. During the 1994-2003 period, Taiwan's exports to China as a percentage to the country's overall exports rose 8.8 percent, while Taiwan's imports from China as a ratio to its imports expanded 6.4 percent, making China the trading partner with which Taiwan has registered the highest expansion rate in two-way trade.
■ Insurance rules relaxed
The Ministry of Finance granted new access Monday for Taiwan-based insurance companies wishing to edge into China by easing the rules to allow local firms to invest in their Chinese counterparts through shareholding. The rule change has been approved by the Executive Yuan and takes immediate effect, said Chen Wei-lung (陳惟龍), deputy director of the ministry's Department of Insurance. From now on, Taiwan-based insurance companies can invest in their China-based counterparts through buying their shares, Chen said. An annual ceiling of NT$2 billion (US$60.6 million) has been imposed on Taiwanese insurers who wish to do this, in line with requirements set by both Taiwanese and Chinese authorities, he added.
■ New store goes online
To further explore the development potential of the e-commerce market, Uni-President Enterprise Group (統一集團) has integrated its subsidiaries' resources to help people start businesses on the Internet. Yeh Shui-hsing (葉水興), president of Presco Netmarketing Inc (統一數網), unveiled a new online store, Bcity (貝可市場), at a press conference yesterday. This portal can save storeowners complicated application procedures and problems involving goods delivery and payment collection. Yeh said consumers trading on Bcity can make payments and pick up products at the 3,538 7-Eleven outlets nationwide, a guarantee that Internet trading frauds will be less likely to take place. "Within three hours, you can set up your virtual store in our Bcity," Yeh said.
■ NT dollar weakens
The New Taiwan dollar yesterday turned weak against its US counterpart, declining NT$0.020 to close at NT$32.945 on the Taipei foreign exchange market.
Turnover was US$591 million.
Among the rows of vibrators, rubber torsos and leather harnesses at a Chinese sex toys exhibition in Shanghai this weekend, the beginnings of an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven shift in the industry quietly pulsed. China manufactures about 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, most of it the “hardware” on display at the fair — whether that be technicolor tentacled dildos or hyper-realistic personalized silicone dolls. Yet smart toys have been rising in popularity for some time. Many major European and US brands already offer tech-enhanced products that can enable long-distance love, monitor well-being and even bring people one step closer to
Malaysia’s leader yesterday announced plans to build a massive semiconductor design park, aiming to boost the Southeast Asian nation’s role in the global chip industry. A prominent player in the semiconductor industry for decades, Malaysia accounts for an estimated 13 percent of global back-end manufacturing, according to German tech giant Bosch. Now it wants to go beyond production and emerge as a chip design powerhouse too, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said. “I am pleased to announce the largest IC (integrated circuit) Design Park in Southeast Asia, that will house world-class anchor tenants and collaborate with global companies such as Arm [Holdings PLC],”
TRANSFORMATION: Taiwan is now home to the largest Google hardware research and development center outside of the US, thanks to the nation’s economic policies President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday attended an event marking the opening of Google’s second hardware research and development (R&D) office in Taiwan, which was held at New Taipei City’s Banciao District (板橋). This signals Taiwan’s transformation into the world’s largest Google hardware research and development center outside of the US, validating the nation’s economic policy in the past eight years, she said. The “five plus two” innovative industries policy, “six core strategic industries” initiative and infrastructure projects have grown the national industry and established resilient supply chains that withstood the COVID-19 pandemic, Tsai said. Taiwan has improved investment conditions of the domestic economy
Sales in the retail, and food and beverage sectors last month continued to rise, increasing 0.7 percent and 13.6 percent respectively from a year earlier, setting record highs for the month of March, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. Sales in the wholesale sector also grew last month by 4.6 annually, mainly due to the business opportunities for emerging applications related to artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing technologies, the ministry said in a report. The ministry forecast that retail, and food and beverage sales this month would retain their growth momentum as the former would benefit from Tomb Sweeping Day